When it's time to "turn down" we do it right...

André Obin "Gazelle" (Artisan Loyalist Remix)

While most people are "turning up" on Friday night or "going HAM" over the weekend, I'm often looking for a more chill vibe while I clean my apartment and try to get a jumpstart on the upcoming week, transcribing an interview or writing for an upcoming issue. Recently a friend put me on to André Obin and I've gotta tell you, he makes some amazing music to soundtrack all of these "turned-down" activities.
The American synth-pop producer has been hard at work readying his sophomore LP for a 2014 release, so it’d be easy to identify The Arsonist Remixes EP--which features some contemporaries giving tracks from his first album a different spin--as a way to tide over his growing fan-base. One of my favorites in particular is Artisan Loyalist’s spin on “Gazelle.”
Where the original track was a slice of aggressive new-wave disco, with processed, robotically inclined vocals and laser synth stabs at the foreground of the mix, Artisan Loyalist opts for balladry, citing Berlin’s dreamily widescreen “Take My Breath Away” as inspiration. “I started the remix for Gazelle with a pulsing bass synth hoping to have some stripped down production to accompany the vocal line,” he said, but just looping one of the string arrangements wasn’t working. “So, after some deliberating, I tried playing some big brassy chords on my Prophet 08 synthesizer and the remix just seemed to come to life.”
I invite you to vibe to this track all weekend long, as I'll be doing, and check out more of Obin's music on his Soundcloud HERE. You can find him on Twitter HERE and on Facebook HERE.